DREAMING OF JULIET
by Sight of the Stars
Summary: While exploring an abandoned mine shaft, a boy finds a weathered and tattered journal, and the story that's inside surprises him.


His gaze darted nervously about, his breath quick and his chest heaving, legs pumping to carry his body forward and stopping only to allow him to cram a torch into the cracked rock every so often. The boy's bow was looped uselessly about his shoulders, arrow pod barren of the projectiles he so dearly needed. He turned his path of sight behind him to see his pursuers had vanished, but when his optics flashed forward once more, a new charge lunged from the shadows, and in his shock and attempt to retreat, the male faltered and tripped. A crack! was all he needed to know that the wooden husk that was his arrow pod had splintered in half as he landed upon his back, limbs pushing into the ground in an attempt to move himself away from his foe.

It advanced relentlessly, scraps of flesh and tattered miner's clothing dropping from its bones and skin upon its unaccustomed movement, a sickening snarl ripping from ruined vocal chords, emitting itself from what seemed like every gash and gaping hole in its body. A well-aimed kick in the gut fell through, and the boy released a startled yelp as he found the grossly thing encased about his limb, entrails sliding across his own flesh as it reached for him.

With a practiced movement and the memory of the presence of the weapon, the explorer harshly jerked his sword from its hilt, spearing the zombie through the chest since the head was guarded by a battered mining helmet and its neck was too far to reach. Using the tool as leverage, he pushed forward with the sharpened diamond rod in order to free his leg, and with his unoccupied left hand the right-handed individual grappled with the pickaxe at his belt, minutely jarring it upwards to land a grip on the handle, and then swung it into the wall beside him.

The aged structure crumpled and he rolled through the opening that was momentarily left, not having the time to remove his sword from the creature's rotting flesh before he did so. Rock crumpled from above and crashed down upon his makeshift entrance into the adjacent tunnel before the creature could follow, plunging his refuge into darkness, and the spooked being pressed himself up against the cool stone behind him, breathing labored with fright.

He shivered in the chill, orbs of blue vision failing to pierce the pitch of the shadows. His right hand traced warily across the cold rock until it encountered a small crevice. As he lit a torch he wasted no time in jamming the source of light into the minute opening, blinking hard with the sudden presence of illumination.

It took only a moment for him to realize that he wasn't in another tunnel of the mineshaft. He rose slowly to his feet, leaning on the wall for support, legs still quaking with fading adrenaline, glancing around the small room he'd stumbled into. To his right was a nearly-ruined crafting table but nothing more. Rails ran leftwards under his booted feet, snaking forth until they ended, broken, at a wall of cobblestone that obviously hadn't always been there. He allowed his eyes to wander along the path paved by the rods of steel, their wooden rungs long-decayed and hardly existent. At the end of the metal guide and pressed against the wall was a rusty minecart with a sturdy chest nestled in its grasp, and the prospect of a reward for his fright brought a smile across his dirt-streaked features.

Glancing about almost as if he expected someone to be watching, he approached his prize. As he did this, he couldn't help but noticing the flickering light of the torch reflecting minutely off of a pile of something alabaster in the corner, and this time he shivered with more than just the cold.

Quivering fingers flipped the thin latch of the container upwards before lifting the lid. He blanched at the stench that burst forth, waving it away before leaning forward to peer inside. Glee graced him as he was met with a pile of shimmering, enchanted books. He swung his large courier bag from across his shoulder after removing his bow, which had perpendicularly crossed the strap, and carefully fit the precious few magical records into the oversized satchel. Optics greedily sought more spoils, moving aside loaves of aged, rock-hard bread to discover a diamond, which was quickly pocketed. Having looted the rarities, he swung his bag back over his shoulders, as well as his bow, and pulled himself to his feet, ready to depart.

He wasn't sure what caused him to cast a glance back into the ajar chest, but when he did, he hesitated to retrieve what he saw. The lad swept away the grainy crumbs that dappled the bound leather and he couldn't stop his fingers from lingering on the worn material. With reverence he lifted the tattered book from its prison and made a move to place it protectively inside of his jacket when he once more glimpsed the bones in the corner. Slowly, the adventurer retreated with careful steps back to his torch, eyes never leaving the cluster of remains, even as he sunk down to the ground below the comforting light source.

He finally ripped his attention away from the harrowing entity and down to the book in his hands. He trailed his hands once more over the tattered cover, appreciatively imagining how marvelous the binding would have looked directly following its careful crafting. Minding the fragile state of the holding material, he opened the volume to find that the pages were still crisp and intact. His brow furrowed as he looked at the pages. They were in English—a language he'd nearly forgotten how to read after ages of decoding and understanding the Braille-like runes of enchanted primers. He focused on the scrawled characters and after a few moments their meanings seemed to flow back from his memory and into his conscience.

_**Day 1 - August 3**__  
The supervisor—damn, I already forgot his name—told me to keep "a journal, because diaries are for pansies." Said it gets lonely down here and that I need something to vent into when I get sick of the other miners. He also said that we've all gotta have "something to leave behind" when the "canary stops singin'." Don't know if that was s'pposed to be some twisted miner's joke but I didn't find it funny; what the hell happened to a simple 'break a leg'? Hope this ain't a trend._

His nose wrinkled with disdain as he carefully thumbed through the pages, seeing that it only went on and on and on. He thought of leaving this god-forsaken tomb. The boy glanced up around him, pausing to listen. The sound of a spider somewhere—probably on the other side of the cobblestone wall of the room—ground upon his ears, and he instinctively reached for his trusty diamond sword, but with a swear under his breath remembered that it was outside past the ruined wall that completely blocked his entrance, probably still hanging from the zombie's chest. Perhaps now wasn't a good time to leave after all. He looked back down to his newfound entertainment and picked back up where he'd left off.

_They got beds for us in the main room and by beds I mean a blanket and a pillow or two thrown on the dirt. It's such an open area and in a way it sort of bothers me. They've already sealed off the exit, too, to try and prevent any of the dust and crap from bothering the "sensitive, fragile, and precious" environment outside. Supervisor said we got a little spout that runs down along the closed-off tunnel we used to get down this far to roll down little balls of leather-wrapped rations every once in awhile, but that's about all._

_All of this, it's not too bad so far, I reckon. I got a "get-out-of-jail-free" ticket on working today 'cause I was the last late arrival. Everyone'll come back in about a few hours—around nine or so, I think. Until then I think I've just got to settle in and stuff. A joy, huh?_

_…Christ, there ain't a thing to do here. It's been a couple of hours and this place is unnerving me so I can't just sleep. I'm still alone 'cause the supervisor left right after he gave me this thing and ain't no one's gotten back yet even though the pick sounds stopped a bit ago. This dreaded place already gives me the heebie-jeebies, really. But the pay's good so I guess I'll_

It cut off there. The explorer frowned as he thought for a moment. The dirt room was a dreadful distance away from where he was now—at the middle of the mine shaft, not here at the end of it. _They must've moved camp at some point,_ he thought, _Might have gotten overrun by mobs._

_**Day 2 - August 4**__  
Apparently, I'm gonna be called "Poe" since I'm the only guy who writes in the journal. They walked in while I was writing yesterday and started laughing at me. As far as I've heard, they've either used their own pages for toilet paper or other… just really bad…things that I won't speak of. I guess they've gotten to thinkin' it's too manly or something to write in a journal. I've gotta admit that I didn't wanna at first too, but it's kind of nice. Gotta have something to do after a hard day of work._

_Speaking of which, work was actually kinda nice. We've got a canary that sung a bunch and it's gone and picked up on a few good songs so everyone sang along with it, mining with the beat and stuff. Was actually a neat thing to be a part of. Still haven't talked to the others much but it's obvious they're not city-folk but deep-country folk. I reckon I myself come from from pretty far out there, but they're from way out there. Don't bother me none but that's all I really know about them._

_Ain't seen the supervisor since I got here. Maybe he's gone down deeper in the tunnels to get the first pick at the good stuff and hopefully they're having more luck down there. Or maybe not 'cause I've only found coal so far and it's a bitch to carry since the rail crews ain't got the minecarts finished yet. So far I've found out that they unseal the tunnel long 'nuff every week to let some guys ship the load up on one of the fancy powered rails. Apparently the 'one little spout' that we had is just for air and the supervisor was just trying to pick on me since I'm the new guy. So we get food when we send in our shipments. This is gonna be a long two years._

He blinked, disgust contorting his features. Two years?! The lad could hardly bear to spend more than a day in the mine shafts, but to have been down in this place for two years? He shuddered at the mere concept. Of course, they hadn't been alone at the time and it probably hadn't been infested with cave spiders and various other things that prowled in the dark, but even the guy had said that it gave him the creeps.

_I thought about home today. I don't miss it much—living alone on the ranch with bills and work and worrying about the animals kind of sucked sometimes. I'm working here to save up some money to buy a place in the city or maybe just saving to go back home and hire people to do the work for me. I'm not quite sure yet._

_**Day 5 - August 7  
**__Shit, talk about some busy days. Been too busy to write since we been working extra hours. Apparently they'll go and cut our food supplies if we don't get nothing other than iron and coal up there soon and we can't just leave 'cause we're under contract or some stupid bull like that. I've been finishing my work and dropping like a fly into bed for the past couple of days but today the food came in 'cause we found a diamond today and sent it up so everybody calmed down and they're throwing a sort of party. I guess they think talking around a fire and drinking a little whiskey and talking about home a party since they're acting like it's the greatest thing but I don't think so. I personally ain't got the stomach for alcohol at all so I'm sitting it out by the torch next to my bed. I've gotten used to calling it that even if it's not much of one because I sleep here and it's easier to just write 'bed' than 'that-thing-sorta-like-a-bed-but-ain't-much-of-one .'_

_They talkin' about their wives back at home now and how "she cooks real good" and telling stories about their children doing stupid stuff. They invited me over to tell stories about my wife and kids but I told them that I don't got a wife and I've got no kids and they just stared and stared and made a few jokes and then went back to talking. Some of my folks think I shoulda've settled down and found myself a nice woman to do my cooking and cleaning but I didn't think I'd like a woman that did just that. People sorta think I'm weird when I tell them that but I don't like boring people and I want my wife to shine, ya'know? I ain't got time for someone that's needy all the time, either. Well, I didn't. Now I'm stuck down here and by the time I'm gonna get out I'll be 26 and won't have much time left._

_No one wants to marry a guy named Orion Dick anyway. What the hell were my folks thinking? Was bad 'nuff that I had the last name Dick and then they went and named me after some stars or something. I hate starts 'cause I kinda hate the dark but I still don't know what made me think I'd like being holed up in this dark place. Maybe I really am weird and maybe when I get out I'll go see if my childhood sweetheart is still sticking it out on her own. We were buds in school and stuff 'cause we both got made fun of 'cause of our names._

_But she still probably ain't gonna wanna marry a guy named Orion Dick anyway._


End file.
